Architecture · Mores · Ethnography

Stone dovecotes on stilts in France and their economic purpose

Old Dovecotes in France. Curious stone structures on tall legs can be found in many regions of France. The dovecotes stood apart from the other buildings, somewhere on the grounds of the estate, and always above ground level, to protect the birds from damp, rats and small predators. Pigeons were

Architecture · Faith

This angular, ungainly concrete building, propped up by a single massive pier, is the Chapel of Saint Hildegard in Düsseldorf, built in 1962-1970 to a design by Gottfried Böhm

No decoration, no refinements, just bare concrete. Only a barely protruding bell tower slightly disturbs the Brutalist gloom of the concrete pile. The design echoes a number of other works by the famous architect, whose arsenal includes many churches that would serve perfectly well in the universe of "Mad

Evening view of New York with crosses of lit windows glowing on the facades of three skyscrapers.

NB! · Archive · Architecture · Faith · New York

Illuminated crosses on New York skyscrapers at Easter in the 1950s and 1960s

Easter illumination on New York's skyscrapers in the 1950s and 1960s. For many years in a row the city was decked out for Easter with luminous crosses on a great number of landmark buildings, but at some point it all came to an end...

NB! · Architecture · Moscow · Museums

The marble staircase of the main building of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts is called the pink staircase, after the colour of the marble with which it is faced

The marble staircase of the main building of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts is called the pink staircase, after the colour of the marble with which it is faced. The variegated marbles used to finish the staircase were brought from Hungary, and the stone was purchased by the

A tall Gothic altar screen with statues of saints and a crucifix, lit by projectors in green, pink and blue.

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Observations · Heritage

Projectors colour the altar screen of St Albans Cathedral to show how it may have looked before the Reformation

The altar screen of the Anglican cathedral of St Albans has been coloured by a system of projectors to show how it might have looked before the Reformation. Oddly enough, a robot dog has become part of the installation; if I have understood correctly, it is a tactical military robot

NB! · Archaeology · Architecture · Faith · Rome

How the Circus of Caligula, 1st Century AD, Became the Modern Vatican

Architecture · Moscow · Heritage · People

Italy puts on sale 15th-century house in Palazzo Felicini where Leonardo da Vinci lived

An Italian house where Leonardo da Vinci once lived is up for sale. The building is currently owned by a former Italian footballer. The residence in Emilia dates from the 15th century and forms part of the Palazzo Felisini. Da Vinci lived here after moving to Bologna with his patron

Interior of a Gothic cathedral with white columns and ribbed vaults, with a group of people in period dress in the foreground.

Architecture · Faith · Art

A company strolling beneath cathedral vaults in an oil painting on panel

The artist Laurent Grasso reimagines the interior of the Church of St Bavo by the Dutch draughtsman Pieter Jansz Saenredam of 1631 in his painting of 2023. And the company strolling beneath the cathedral vaults elegantly turns, elegantly turns into a little cloud of mist. Studies of the Past, oil

Archive · Architecture · Art · Museums

Carlo Scarpa's design for the 1953 exhibition of the Sicilian Renaissance painter Antonello da Messina entered the golden fund of exhibition architecture

Carlo Scarpa's design for the 1953 exhibition of the Sicilian Renaissance painter Antonello da Messina entered the golden fund of exhibition architecture. Scarpa draped the rooms of the Palazzo Zanca in multicoloured cotton cloths, concealing walls, floors and every scrap of decoration, and leaving only niches for the

NB! · Architecture · Paris

A detail of the interior decoration of the Château de Rambouillet, the summer residence of the French presidents outside Paris

NB! · Archaeology · Architecture · Humour

I do not know whether your life will ever be the same after you learn that ancient columns actually looked LIKE THIS

Notre-Dame de Paris covered in scaffolding, with a yellow tower crane, behind the stone embankment of the Seine.

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Observations · Heritage · Paris

Reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris continues, seen from the Seine embankment

Work on the reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris is in full swing. But, frankly, one dreads to imagine what it will look like inside